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17 Years After Spill, Lego Keep Washing Up on the English Coast

Sea shells, buried treasure and Lego — you can hunt for anything on the beach.

The container ship Tokio Express was en route from Rotterdam, Netherlands to New York City in 1997 when a gigantic wave collided with it 20 miles west of Cornwall, England. The nearly catastrophic incident knocked 62 containers off the ship — one of them held nearly five million Lego pieces.

The ship's manifest accounted for 4,756,940 individual Lego pieces in the lost container. Coincidentally, many of the lost Lego toy kits were nautical themed — including pieces like scuba divers, deep sea creatures and pirates.

Seventeen years after the spill, thousands of the small, buoyant Lego pieces continue washing up on the shores of Cornwall, Devon and Wales.

Tracey Williams, a writer and co-founder of a local beach cleaning group, began noticing the tiny plastic treasures in the late 1990s near her former home in South Devon, England. "At the time, we didn't really know where it was coming from, other than it must have been from a cargo spill. I forgot all about it for 10 years," Williams told Mashable.

When she arrived in her new home in Newquay, on the coast of Cornwall, she was surprised to see how many minifigures were still washing up from the same fateful spill. Even after years of drifting through the currents, the Lego still look pristine and perfect.

Among the most prized findings that beach combers possess are black and green minifigure dragons and tiny black octopi from the FrightKnights, Divers, Pirates and Aquazone toy kits.

However, Lego isn't the only type of spillage that Tracey Williams and other beach combers find. "As well as the Lego, we pick up thousands of glow sticks, bottle tops, shotgun cartridges and shotgun wads, as well as IV drip bags, lighters and toothbrushes. The last three are all from cargo spills," said Williams.

Finding Lego can be a treat for kids and adults, but they serve as a reminder of how great an impact cargo spills can have. There is no predicting how much longer the millions of minifigures will continue their ocean journey.

Mashable
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